264 TRANSACTIONS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. [Vou. IIT. 
A trader whose name I have not ascertained had sent several canoes 
as faras Rainy Lake in 1765. The Indians there having been without 
supplies for several years, detained and plundered them. He repeated 
his attempt the next year with the same result. With astonishing 
perseverance he fitted out a third expedition in 1766 and was rewarded 
with success. Leaving part of his goods at Rainy Lake to be traded out 
among the Indians there, he was permitted to proceed with the remainder 
beyond Lake Winnipeg. Other traders soon followed in his footsteps. 
In 1769, the brothers Frobisher formed a partnership with Todd and 
McGill of Montreal for the purpose of prosecuting this trade on a large 
scale. The Indians of Rainy Lake were not yet entirely conciliated and 
plundered their canoes, but before they were informed of this disaster, 
their supply of goods for the next year was at the Grand Portage and 
they were in a manner forced to proceed. Their second venture was 
successful and they reached Lake Winnipeg in 1770. The partnership 
was then enlarged and to borrow their own words, “having men of 
conduct and abilities to conduct it in the interior country, the Indians 
were abundantly supplied and at the same time well treated, new posts 
were discovered as early as the year 1774, which to the French were 
totally unknown, and had we not been interrupted by new adventurers 
the public in the course of a few years would have been well acquainted 
with the value and extent of that country.” 
Cadotte and Henry may probably be classed among these new 
adventurers. Their first expedition to the northwest of Lake Superior 
was undertaken in 1775. When crossing Lake Winnipeg they fell in 
with Peter Pond, Joseph and Thomas Frobisher, and Mr Paterson of 
Montreal, all bound for the mouth of the Saskatchewan. The united 
fleet numbered thirty canoes manned by one hundred and thirty men. 
At Fort Cumberland they separated, Pond going to Fort Dauphin, 
Cadotte to Fort des Prairies with four canoes, and the Frobishers and 
Henry to the Churchill River with ten others. Four different interests 
were then struggling for the trade of the Saskatchewan Valley but they 
soon combined to keep up prices. A trade-musket was valued at twenty 
beaver skins; a stroud blanket at ten; a white blanket at eight; a one 
pound axe at three; half a pint of powder or ten bullets at one. Their 
greatest profit was however made from the sale of knives, beads, flints, 
awls, and other small articles. Henry charged his rivals, the factors of 
the Hudson Bay Company, with practising many gross impositions upon 
the natives, such as the sale of prints for charms and sugar and spice as 
medicines. 
Trade was remarkably brisk and lucrative. During the winter of 
